98 SIDELINES MARCH 2014
FOR HORSE PEOPLE • ABOUT HORSE PEOPLE
Continued on page 100
Betsy and Made
You Look share a
moment together.
Photo by Actions Shots
Photography
Betsy Burton:
Always
Searching
Too Cool For School has a lifelong home with Betsy.
Photo by Actions Shots Photography
By Katie Navarra
Betsy Burton has enough frequent flier miles to travel the world.
But, she isn’t interested in using those miles to see the world.
Instead, she uses her travel rewards to visit Thoroughbreds
whose careers on the track are over. For Betsy, no other breed
can match the athleticism and loyalty the Thoroughbred offers.
She knows the racing industry well and understands that once
a horse stops paying their way or a stall isn’t available, the horse
is up for sale. “These are perfectly wonderful creatures that really
need another chance,” she
said.
Betsy grew up on her par-
ent’s horse farm in Southside,
Virginia, where she still lives
today. It was her mother who
inspired a lifelong devotion to
riding. Betsy received her first
pony when she was eight, but
it was a friend’s hunt horse that
set her riding career in motion.
“I learned to jump on that hunt
horse and I was hooked,” she
said.
By the time she was 12, she
owned her first good show
horse, an off-the-track Thor-
oughbred. From that moment
on, she knew no other breed
would do.
Her enthusiasm for Thor-
oughbreds never wavered. As
an adult, she has developed a keen ability to identify a jumping
prospect simply by looking at a photograph or watching a video. In
some cases, only an in-person meeting will do. “I get this feeling,
an inkling, a hunch. I can tell which ones will be good over jumps,”
she explained.
Over the years she has developed close relationships with
trainers who will call her when a horse is ready to leave the track.
She also scavenges the Internet relentlessly in search of the next
Thoroughbred that needs a second chance. Many of the horses
she takes in are from rescue organizations like New Vocations
Racehorse Adoption Program
and Finger Lakes Thorough-
bred Adoption in Farmington,
New York, among others.
Rescue organizations pro-
vide Betsy with detailed in-
formation about each horse,
their personality and their
potential. Like Betsy, rescue
organizations are dedicated
to the horse’s best interest,
which is how Betsy came to
own Made You Look (regis-
tered in the Jockey Club as
Storming Marine).
Made You Look was listed
on New Vocations’ website for
weeks. She could tell by his
photo he had talent, but didn’t
have room to take him in. She
couldn’t understand why he
e
Second Chances
